Branding // Marketing // Events

The Philly 10K

The Philly 10K is an annual road race in the heart of Philadelphia that offers runners a the unique chance to run through dense urban neighborhoods never raced through before. Now in its fourth year, The Philly 10K has sold out each year in less than a week.

The Philly 10K is our first brand built and owned in house through a joint partnership with Philadelphia Runner. We oversaw brand development, naming, and identity and executed marketing strategy, partnerships, event planning, and all aspects of the runner experience.

Anthym

Anthym is a new concept running store in State College, Pa. opened in 2015. Anthym was created to appeal to the increasingly dynamic athlete who isn't defined by any one type of sport or workout and seeks community when sweating.

I worked closely with a design team to come up with the brand identity and name. I scouted and planned all brand photoshoots and I oversaw the store launch from build-out to product selection and employee on-boarding. I carefully planned and executed all aspects of the Anthym brand in order to have a highly controlled brand experience that went beyond a traditional specialty running store.

New Jersey Marathon

The Novo Nordisk New Jersey Marathon is the largest marathon in the state. After 21 years of operation, and a change of ownership, the race was looking to refresh the brand and cater to a younger, experience-seeking audience. I was hired to oversee the re-brand and re-launch and then plan and execute all marketing leading up to the race. Design was handled by my collaborator, Rita Carroll, a Philadelphia-based designer who I have worked extensively with.

I was also hired to provide creative guidance on activations during race weekend including re-imaging the race expo, on course entertainment, and the post-race party.

Working with local vendors and partners, the race has re-found it's local credibility and registrations are currently up 20% over either of the previous two years.

hgAthletics

hgAthletics is a sub brand of honeygrow, an innovative fast casual restaurant with locations in New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore, and Washington DC.

hgAthletics was created to provide a community for health-conscious honeygrow customers to come together and explore the city in new ways centered around being active. I worked with their in-house design team to come up with a brand strategy and programming ideas and handed off a roadmap for future events and brand growth for honeygrow to execute.

Community

At the root of nearly everything I have worked on is a strong community presence. I have several years of experience not just building online audiences, but creating real world events that an audience can show up to.

Perhaps the best example of this was the work I did for Philadelphia Runner back in 2012 and 2013. Philadelphia Runner was a widely admired retail brand but lacked a strong community. I reset their brand strategy, positioning the company as the hub of the Philadelphia running community by building a large online audience and creating interesting real life programming that the audience wanted to show up to.

The result of this was a positive deviation in sales growth, a large increase in Philadelphia Runner's online audience, and crowded in-store events where people had to be turned away.

The impact of a strong community strategy was realized during the spring of 2013 after the Boston Marathon bombings. We galvanized our new community, pulling together a solidarity run in less than 48 hours that drew 3,500 people to City Hall for a run down Market Street in downtown Philly. For many runners, this was one of the most meaningful and memorable running experiences they have ever been apart of and is something I remember with tremendous pride to this day.

A year later, we launched The Philly 10K utilizing the audience we had built with Philadelphia Runner. The race sold out in less than a day and has sold out every year since.

I am well versed in A to Z community building and getting customers to show up both online and in the real world.

Philadelphia Runner

I began my career with Philadelphia Runner over 6 years ago. At the time, the store was a successful business with a community engagement problem. I built their online and in-store community, developed meaningful partnerships with running clubs and fitness influencers across the city, and oversaw a major re-brand, working with The Heads of State to modernize the brand and create a simple emblem that the Philly running community proudly wears across their chest to identify themselves as both a brand advocate of Philadelphia Runner and a proud Philadelphia runner.

I cut my teeth at Philadelphia Runner, learning all aspects of brand development and execution as well as event planning. I organized over 50 events of various sizes from small intimate workshops to 4,500 person races. I refreshed their website, built their online audience, and managed their new store build-out in Manayunk.

As a result of this marketing pivot, Philadelphia Runner has seen a noticeable increase in sales growth and brand enthusiasm leading it to be recognized as a top in class business within the running specialty channel.

Generation Run

Students Run Philly Style approached me to refresh their annual race, The Generation Run. Their challenge was to attract new runners while still highlighting their mission within the race's identity.

I worked with SRPS to come up with an age appropriate whimsical beginning-of-summer recess theme that appealed to a larger audience but remained true to SRPSs mission of enriching school kids in the Philadelphia area through running. I also planned and oversaw a post race activation space with recess games and a root beer float garden.

Paid registrations more than doubled, increasing from 300 to 700 that year.